The AI race is the energy race / The Gigawatt Wars: US Losing to China
The AI race isn’t about algorithms, models, or talent; it’s about energy. And right now, China is winning.
1/ The AI race is the energy race. The first nation (or organization) to achieve sustainable energy will unlock the GPUs required to reach AGI. AI’s energy appetite is about to explode. By 2030, global data center capacity demand will nearly triple to 219 gigawatts, with 70% driven by AI workloads. The capital required is $6.7 trillion worldwide for data center infrastructure, and $5.2 trillion for AI workloads alone.
Whoever controls energy infrastructure at scale controls the economic advantage for the next century. This is our generation’s infrastructure moment.
2/ China is winning the energy race while the US continues to lag. In 2024, China installed 329 GW of solar capacity: six times more than the United States. Not double. Not triple. Six times. While we installed 50 GW, they installed enough clean energy to power six UKs.
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Between 2025 and 2029, China is projected to add 2 TW of new solar capacity. Meanwhile, US solar installations are expected to decline 8% in 2026, dropping from 51 GW to 47 GW as policy uncertainty freezes investor confidence.
Here’s what this means: China captured 76% of global clean-tech factory investment in 2024. While America debates regulations, China is methodically tiling the Earth in solar panels and battery production. They’re not merely winning the energy race… they’re lapping us.
3/ Clean energy isn’t optional anymore—it’s the substrate layer for everything that comes next. BloombergNEF reports that US renewable investment fell 36% in the first half of 2025, while China maintained its 44% share of global clean energy investment. The EU saw investment jump 63% as capital fled American policy uncertainty.
Asia-Pacific including China will maintain 70% of global solar market share through 2029. India is racing ahead, projected to overtake the US for second place in solar installations with 237 GW expected versus our 218 GW. The winners of the AI race will be the regions that solved the energy equation first.
This isn’t about environmentalism. This is about whether American companies have access to the abundant, cheap, clean energy required to power the gigawatt AI factories that will cure cancer, extend healthspan, provide personalized education to every child, and solve our hardest problems.
Here’s the opportunity: we have the technology, the capital, and the innovation ecosystem to win this race.
The next wave—fusion, advanced SMRs, next-generation geothermal—is coming online this decade. Solar, wind, and storage are proven technologies today. By 2035, we’ll see hyper-efficient perovskite solar cells hitting 30%+ efficiency, AI-optimized microgrids balancing energy loads autonomously, and upgraded infrastructure replacing fossil fuel plants with clean baseload power.
The path to abundant intelligence runs directly through abundant energy. If we prioritize upgrading our energy infrastructure now—with the same urgency we’re applying to AI development—we unlock the compute capacity needed to power the transformation Sam Altman recently outlined: solving every grand challenge, making the impossible merely a capacity problem.
The winners will be nations that move fast. Not those who debate whether to move. The technology exists. The capital is available. The question is velocity.
This is America’s moment to lead the most important infrastructure build in history. The race isn’t over. It’s just beginning…
Until next time,
Peter
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